


Guided by Moonlight

by Espernyan



Series: Ophelia's Yet Unnamed Bloodborne Series [2]
Category: Bloodborne (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Complete, F/F, Gen, Guiding Moonlight, Hurt/Comfort, Lesbian Character, Minor Injuries, The Power of Extreme Violence, The power of friendship, Trauma, and her sister, great ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-06 23:23:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17949143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Espernyan/pseuds/Espernyan
Summary: Ophelia goes and visits the Clinic.Later, the Upper Cathedral Ward. Shockingly, she makes a few friends up there.Yharnam has yet to wear her down; is it only a matter of time?Sequel to 'What Could a Mere Devil Do?'





	1. Iosefka's Clinic

All was still and silent when Ophelia awoke at the lamp in Iosefka’s Clinic.

That fact alone was enough to set the Hunter immediately on-edge. She held her breath and strained her ears, and heard… nothing. Distant sounds, like the cawing of carrion crows and the howls of beasts, of course, but nothing _there_. Not the creaking of the floor-boards, not the coughing of a patient or even the sound of that damn mouse chewing its way through a wall somewhere.

Her grip on her blessed blade tightened as she turned and strode up the staircase to the clinic proper, anxiety making her stomach tighten as she first realized how eerie wooden walls could be when left unilluminated.

The door at the top of the steps, she reached without incident; when she went to let herself in, however, she found the knob wouldn’t turn. She rattled it a little, her right hand still holding onto the sword which rested on her shoulder, and frowned.

Iosefka didn’t usually lock the door, did she?

It was only then that Ophelia realized she’d never asked for a key – why would she? The door had never been locked. Not after Iosefka had started allowing her in, at least.

She tried knocking, of course, but it yielded no response, and anxiety sank its claws even deeper into Ophelia’s belly.

Seizing the grip of her claymore with both hands, she brought it off her shoulder and held it vertically before herself, tip to the sky, and pressed a kiss to the flat of the blade as she willed it to reveal its true form. Blue-green light rushed to the sword, imbuing it with cosmic power and broadening its blade nearly threefold. _This_ was Ludwig’s guiding moonlight, the holy blade wielded by the Holy Blade himself before being passed down to Ophelia in what was surely a cruel twist of fate.

A thrumming magical blade slipped between the door and its frame made short work of whatever locking mechanism had barred the Hunter entry, and she shouldered her way through, appreciative of the creaking of its hinges simply because it was a noise.

The room she stepped into was empty, its surgical tables and IV stands left without patients to serve, the contents of the shelves and cabinets lining its walls long having since fallen prey to a thick coat of dust.

This, Ophelia knew, was the room she’d had her blood ministered in. The room she’d arisen in while the sun was still setting in the sky, when the night of the Hunt had only just begun.

…

Why had she come to Yharnam, anyways?

It was a question that gave Ophe pause, though only for a moment. She had a cute doctor that needed to be checked on.

The hallway wasn’t empty.

Little blue fellows with oversized, sort-of-deflated heads lounged around in silence, none of them moving a muscle.

Ophelia waved a hand in front of one’s face, and it _did_ look at her, but it made no move otherwise. Its expression seemed somewhat annoyed, and the Hunter apologized quietly before leaving it to its… standing.

This struck Ophelia as being rather odd, but... the blue fellows were odd anyhow, and she didn’t know what to make of it, if anything.

She moved on, following the curve of the hall, headed straight for Iosefka’s office. She turned the corner, unconsciously picking up her pace, and rushed to the door.

Mercifully, this door remained unlocked, and she let herself in – this door didn’t creak, but glided open on well-oiled hinges. It was her own handiwork, and she thanked herself for it, because it meant she could hear a drip in the office proper, up above.

_Drip… drop._

This room was… almost two rooms, really. The ground floor had a small library – just shelves lined with books rather than medical supplies, really, though the shelves made a rather nice, question-mark sort of shape, a straight line leading into an indented curve – and the stairs leading to the upper portion, which Ophelia took two at a time.

The landing held nothing for the Hunter, and she burst into the connected room – it really _was_ two rooms – and froze, her blood turning to ice in an instant.

Iosefka sat behind her broad, wooden desk, her usually pristine white doctor’s attire dyed pale red, blood blossoming around the bladed shaft of the threaded cane driven through her chest and out the back of her chair. The doctor’s precious blood dripped from the weapon’s tip, and Ophelia’s beloved sword clattered to the floor as she rushed to the side of the woman she’d so fancied.

She didn’t check Iosefka’s pulse. Some part of her knew, deep down, that the doctor was already dead.

Ophelia might have killed that part of herself, had she been willing to acknowledge it and less occupied at that particular moment.

Hot tears ran down her cheeks as she cupped the older woman’s pale face in both hands. She pressed her forehead to Iosefka’s, and whimpered, begged, “ _Iosefka? Angel?_ ”

Iosefka didn’t respond.

The Hunter began administering blood vials. The first didn’t change anything. A second, a third, a fourth – she tore the cane from her sweetheart’s chest, then tried a fifth. A sixth.

Th- the next one would work.

It had to.

The seventh vial brought no appreciable change.

The eighth, ninth, and tenth were injected all at once, directly into Iosefka’s chest, and a breath rattled from the doctor’s lungs, weak and wheezy, a singular spasm wracking her whole body before she promptly went limp. She slumped over in her chair, kept upright only by Ophelia’s hand on her cheek.

Rational thought briefly abandoned the Hunter, the meaning of this response failing to register in her mind as the feeling of having Iosefka’s head loll against her hand did something strange to her. Left her in a strange sort of trance.

A giggle caught her ear, and, in a haze, Ophelia whirled around.

The assistant doctor wriggled on an operating table, propped up on her hands and knees, her eyes darting to and fro, her shoes apparently lost to the aether, _her_ doctor’s garb lightly spattered with pale red blood.

Ophelia didn’t need rational thought to make the connection there. Blind rage was perfectly sufficient.

Her hands found her greatsword where it lay on the floor, and as she retrieved it, it shone with turquoise moonlight.

 _Good Hunter,_ it seemed to tell her, _that woman drove her pathetic little sword-cane through dear, darling Iosefka._

 _‘Perhaps I ought to show her what a real sword can do,’_ thought Ophelia, and the sword seemed to thrum with the same idea at the same time, as if the two were in unison.

The woman on the table was babbling madness, and every sound from her damnable throat urged the Hunter forwards.

When Ophelia stood beside the plain, metal table, she raised her precious sword high above her head, stepping forward as she brought the glowing blade down, splitting the table, and the woman upon it, in two. Blood sprayed in a spectacular arc from the wound, decorating Ophelia with a vertical stripe of warm, wet gore.

She tugged the bloodied blade free from the hardwood floor with a grunt and took a step to her right.

The woman who had run Iosefka through gurgled something which was probably insane, but which was, mercifully, cut short when another stroke of Ophelia’s blessed blade took the head of the table clean off.

She left her weapon embedded in the floor, then, and returned to Iosefka, bracing a knee on the chair and taking the white-haired doctor into her arms. She just held her, paying no mind to the fact that she was streaked with gore, as one tends to be after cleaving a woman in twain and subsequently taking off her head for good measure.

For a time, she wept.

At length, Ophelia rose. She pulled her sword free of the floor and gave it a firm shake to dismiss its enchantment and return it to normal size, then brought it over to Iosefka’s desk and set it down. Then, she scooped the doctor up into her arms. She cradled the woman for a moment, pressing her cheek to Iosefka’s head; eventually, she sat the limp woman on the desk to free up her right hand so she could call the Messengers to come and retrieve her guiding moonlight.

As soon as their clammy little hands had taken hold of the commendable blade and spirited it away to the Dream, the moon-scented Hunter picked Iosefka back up and began to walk.


	2. Intermission at Oedon Chapel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ophelia's senses return to her.

A firm hand on her shoulder brought Ophelia back to her senses. A few blinks of her swollen eyes cleared a fog from her vision – or her mind, she wasn’t sure which – and brought the face of her dear friend and mentor into focus.

“You ‘ad me worried, girl.” Eileen’s voice was gentle, soothing; she gave the Hunter’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

There was a weight in Ophe’s arms, a much heavier one than normal, and she looked down to see a blood-soaked Iosefka, the fabric of her blouse gently rising and falling with her breath.

Tears blurred Ophelia’s vision, and she let Eileen guide her to an open spot and help her ease herself to the floor, whereupon she shed tears of joy and relief, holding her doctor close.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Take a deep breath, dear. It'll be alright.


	3. Upper Cathedral Ward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ophelia ventures through the highest tier of Yharnam's Cathedral Ward, ruminates on the nature of the Beastly Scourge, and comes to regret her words and deeds.  
> Her words and deeds directly relating to her dismissing Tiny Tonitrus as not especially useful, of course.
> 
> She also makes a friend, breaks some laws, and finds the strangest things dubious.

Iosefka hadn’t woken up. She lived, but... her eyes were yet to open.

A shudder raced down Ophelia’s spine at the thought, discomfort plain at the echo of Master Willem’s words – at the snippet of his adage, recited in a memory which had clung to Laurence’s twisted, bestial skull.

_We are born of the blood. Made men by the blood. Undone by the blood._

_Our eyes are yet to open…_

_Fear the Old Blood._

She wiped her holy blade clean of the blood of the larval godlings she’d just finished spearing and rocked it into the scabbard that now sat diagonally across her back. Gehrman had taken it upon himself to fashion one for her, and it was really quite the clever thing, more of a shrouded bracket than anything else. A ring to fit the blade at the bottom, and an open-sided one at the top, which one of the sword’s quillons would hook over, thus holding it in place. To retrieve it, she needed only to draw it a few inches up and let it fall sideways out of the open slot in the wooden covering’s side.

Not the most elegant of solutions, perhaps, but… it made her feel more civilized, not walking around with a naked blade rested on her shoulder all the time.

The wind howled there, in the Upper Cathedral Ward. Tossed her silvery hair about and whistled in her ears, as though it, too, had been whipped into a frenzy by the abominable moon and the paleblood sky.

The front gate to the facility which rose above the Church’s workshop was, naturally, locked. Of note, however, was that it was locked by a remotely-actuated mechanism- she could see one of the city’s now-familiar big levers through the bars, and, though she was no mechanic, it sure looked to her like it’d open the big fancy gate. All she had to do was get around and throw the lever from the other side.

The sight of a Church ’Doctor’ wielding a scythe wreathed in hazy blue magic brought Gehrman to mind – she had found rather an uncanny scythe in one of her first forays into the so-called ‘Chalice Dungeons’, having followed the advice of a fellow Hunter from another world – he had taken one look at her big magical sword and given her directions to a special sort of dungeon which had, supposedly, been shifted higher in the labyrinth, just as strata of stone in the earth could be warped and moved about until they were far from where they ‘belonged’. She had taken the man’s advice and ventured into the catacombs, where she was mauled several times by bell-summoned spiders before she found that selfsame scythe.

Like Eileen’s ‘Blade of Mercy’, the weapon’s blade was forged of siderite, a supposedly meteoric alloy, and it was a proper trick weapon – a curved sword when wielded without the handle, and a large and fairly intimidating scythe when transformed. Tricked, if you prefer.

She had brought the thing back to the Dream’s workshop, and Gehrman had seen it and reacted as if she’d told him she’d be his new mother, by virtue of having married his (presumably) formerly only mother.

That is to say, with surprise, underlain with confusion and _ju_ _uu_ _st_ a _touch_ of fear.

She didn’t _know_ , though, she supposed. For all she knew, Gehrman had five moms.

His reaction had, naturally, stuck out, and she told him where she’d found it – relief had come across his face, then, and he’d offered to reinforce it for her.

Naturally, Ophelia had accepted that offer without a second thought. The man had a way with bloodstone and gems and such; he’d been in the workshop for a long time, and had probably spent an awful lot of time in its real-world counterpart, given the dream he hosted featured it and only it.

Questions about Ophelia’s ‘devil’ had gone unanswered, and he’d suggested he might be more willing to discuss such matters at a later time. She could respect that.

The oversized man in the gray longcoat staggered back as she parried him with a pistol shot, and she’d ended his life with a visceral attack.

‘One of the darker Hunter techniques’ was right; even as routine as it had become to her, Ophelia had to acknowledge that she was thrusting her hand through flesh and bone like a claw seeking to scramble organs and tear prey to shreds. Loathe as she was to admit it, she had taken it well in stride when the messengers told her (passed her a note explaining it, to be more exact) about the maneuver.

The inside of the stone structure was dark, though smoke billowed from the twin chimneys jutting from its rooftop, and she encountered a crouched, hooded ‘Brainsucker’ in the first room.

It hadn’t noticed her; by the time it had, there was a sharpened length of steel protruding two feet from its chest. She jerked the blade upwards, just to be sure, and the creature gurgled its last as she kicked it off of her sword.

The Hunter got the distinct impression she wouldn’t be meeting any new friends, here. Those gross, squishy footfalls from below certainly didn’t sound like they belonged anyone _she’d_ be willing to shake hands with.

She advanced, holy blade gripped with both hands, held out at the ready before her, and found that the next room, a large foyer, was lit by a large, fairly spectacular chandelier.

There were beasts, there. Three of them, the big, quadrupedal werewolf-things. Early victims of the scourge? Or perhaps they had simply been predisposed- no, that’s not right.

Was it an affinity?

No, no. Beasthood – the _Scourge_ – was a plague. To be transformed to a larger, more drastic degree than was common suggested a predisposition, a susceptibility, a…

… Surely not a _willingness_.

Perhaps people succumbed when their will to fight it was overcome, but Ophelia found the idea that people might have outright accepted it utterly abhorrent. The thought of someone surrendering their humanity was anathema to her.

It was tantamount to blasphemy. To turn one’s back on mankind…

And, yet- somehow she knew there were people who would do such a thing with gratitude, even _zeal_.

A righteous fury welled up within her as she watched the blue-eyed _abominations_ of fur and teeth cling to the light fixture. She sheathed her holy blade and bade the Messengers to fetch her ‘Whirligig Saw’.

The little fellows did so immediately, the weapon’s haft emerging from a puddle of bubbling black ichor, followed by the head – a mace with a short spike on its top, locked into a mechanism bearing a pair of engraved circular saws which flickered gently with flame.

It had been imbued quite thoroughly with fire, her buzzsaw, and the three fire gems reacted as she grasped the handle, sending proper fire dancing along the edges of the serrated steel disks before the whole head of the weapon was engulfed in glorious, purifying flame.

_Know thyself, know thy enemy._

Serrated weapons wreaked havoc upon victims of the Scourge, their flesh, not having taken bestial form naturally, being particularly susceptible to the rending cuts of serrated weapons. Taken into consideration in concert with the resilience of their thick hides… suffice it to say there was a reason that the saw-cleaver and saw-spear were so beloved by so many Hunters.

Fire, of course, was for purification; her aptitude for the arcane resonated with magic weapons and weapons imbued with magic by blood-gems, and the whirligig, in addition to being awesome, mechanically-fascinating, and strangely nostalgic, was delightfully receptive to enchantment.

The other vulnerabilities she knew the beasts had were being shot in the face and a hunger for blood; the latter, she exploited by hurling a blood cocktail a good ways across the room, sending the creatures leaping after it as soon as the fancy glass bottle shattered upon the floor.

Their movement sent the chandelier a-rocking, but those chains holding it up looked plenty sturdy, and she rushed after her prey, lunging at the beast in the rear of the pack as it greedily lapped up the Yharnam equivalent of a fine wine.

The sawblades whirred madly as the weapon’s mechanism drove them onwards, and Ophe slashed the thing across the beast’s flank, setting its filthy black fur alight and chewing up its flesh from stern to stem, dousing the Hunter in its vile blood and driving its slightly more unfortunate – for they wouldn’t have the mercy of being caught unawares and finished off in one fell swoop – brethren into a frenzy of bloodlust and mindless aggression.

She swung the buzzsaw overhand and over her head, bringing it down between the next beast’s shoulders, pulping parts of its spine and lungs and maybe its heart- she didn’t take the time to look, but she thought she might’ve gotten some heart in that blow.

The last beast raked her side with a grotesque, overgrown set of claws, sending her staggering sideways and tearing part of her crow’s-feather cape off.

It wasn’t a particularly mighty blow or anything of the sort, but another of those and she’d be on death’s door – she really needed to talk to the Doll about that, make the porcelain woman toughen her up without asking or something, just so she couldn’t decide something else was more important. The wounds were weeping openly, one of them deep enough to have met a rib and skipped off slightly, cutting a connected, shallower trench after a slight jump diagonally. Adrenaline ensured it didn’t hinder her too much, but, if left unhealed, that would change drastically.

The beast stalked towards her with deceptive patience, and as it drew near she plucked the hat from her head and whipped it at the varmint’s face, sending it flinching. She capitalized by thrusting the whirligig saw’s threshing heads into and through the beast’s neck and part of its head, spraying the young woman with blood and brain and bits of bone (some of which actually stuck into the leather of her attire, which made her even more unhuggable than the shower of brain matter had already rendered her).

Her foe slumped to the ground, and another brainsucker rushed around the corner, out of a hallway that ran beneath the one she’d entered this foyer from. It launched its ensnaring magic missiles at her – a cluster of brilliant blue orbs, shrouded in a collective arcane haze – and caught her with them, but not before she managed to retrieve her tiny Tonitrus from her pocket and throw it to the floor with a sharp flick of her wrist.

The diminutive magical morningstar struck the tiled floor and reacted spectacularly, sending a series of bright blue lightning-strikes racing towards, to, and beyond the unfortunate critter, which didn’t even last long enough to make some sort of disgusting noise as it was electrocuted.

The little Hunter Tool leapt back into Ophelia’s hand when its work was done, and she kissed it, regretting ever having doubted it.

When the dust had settled and she found herself still breathing, she administered a blood vial to herself and sent her whirligig saw back with the Messengers as she checked over her wounds. Once satisfied they had healed well enough, she moved on.

She was stepping into the lower-floor hall opposite of the side of the building she’d entered on when that huge chandelier came crashing down behind her, raising one hell of a clatter and leaving the Hunter surreptitiously checking her pants.

Her next foe was a brainsucker, and her tiny Tonitrus’ next kill was a brainsucker.

Transmuting a mixture of blood and quicksilver into lightning seemed pretty worthwhile, now – Ophelia had been used to magic items only costing a portion of the ~5 ‘bullets’ worth of blood she’d get from drawing blood into her loading-flask, and using all the blood plus one shot’s worth of mercury had seemed a bit much before.

Now, of course, spending that blood and ‘silver meant she didn’t have to deal with those stupid alien… _things_.

Another brainsucker tried to ambush her at the top of a ladder and got zapped.

She stepped out onto a balcony overlooking the foyer, with a door leading out the front of the building to her left and a distracted slimy creature before her – she scarcely needed more direction than that.

She stabbed the abominable thing in the back and was promptly grabbed from behind by its hidden friend, which stuck some probing appendage into her skull and began sucking…

… Not her brain.

Even as she struggled against it, thrashing and kicking and biting, she could see through the translucent blue membrane of the… sucking-thing… that it wasn’t slurping her brains, but something non-physical.

As if feeding off of the insight she had gained.

No, not ‘as if’ – that was literally what it was doing. She saw a second… unit(?) pass through the tube, and felt her vision dim slightly, if only momentarily.

The heel of her boot found the inside of the creature’s knee, and she lashed out, swinging upwards and giving whatever the hell was between the disgusting creature’s thighs a good kicking.

It shrieked and clutched at what Ophelia presumed were its weird blue genitals, and the Hunter’s left hand flew to the grip of her silver saw-sword, whipping it free of its sheath with the soft rasp of leather, as one would expect from a properly-made scabbard. Though, done so quickly, it came out as more of a hiss, really.

She drew the sword’s non-serrated edge across her right arm, cutting shallowly into her own flesh to bloody the weapon as she incanted the words of a spell, its completion sending electrical blue sparks dancing up and down the blade. The motion of cutting herself flowed naturally into a wide slash, and she cut cleanly through the brainsucker’s mushy, sticky head, splattering the wall behind it and the balcony to her left with strange gray goo.

“Filth,” she sniffed, and spat on its corpse in disgust.

She heard no more creatures within the facility, and thus went around to see if she hadn’t left anything of worth behind. A set of fancy clothes – the uniform of members of the Choir, most like – conveniently sized for a woman of similar height and weight to Ophelia, an interesting hat with an integrated ‘blindfold’ of some light, silvery metal, which, like the uniform, she had seen that studious Hunter at Byrgenwerth wearing.

Ophelia had lost her hat when she’d thrown it at the beast, but, though the blindfold _did_ allow the wearer to see through… she found it remarkably unflattering.

There was a nice, wide-brimmed hat she’d seen in the Nightmare – she’d go grab that later. It’d make for a nice change of pace, she reckoned.

The only other thing she’d found was what the Messengers helpfully told her was the ‘Cosmic Eye Watcher Badge’, which, in practice, was a decorative badge shaped like an eye.

Kind of underwhelming, really, but it meant the fellows in the bath in the Hunter’s Dream would have new wares on offer next time she visited, which was quite nice.

She learned a silly new pose from a corpse standing outside on the upper floor, with one arm vertical and the other horizontal – she instinctively knew it was for ‘making contact’, but beyond that, it was anyone’s guess.

Just out of curiosity, she stood facing the moon and ‘made contact’ for several minutes.

The blood moon didn’t say anything back.

 _Hmph!_ _How rude._

As she threw the lever to open the main gate of the building, a little blue man, like the ones at the Clinic – a wave of anxiety hit her as she realized she hadn’t seen Gilbert nor thought to look for him, so upset had she been over Iosefka and the dastard who had run her through – came padding towards her from the left.

She tried ‘making contact’ with him, too, and he hit her with a gangly open palm, earning himself a swift kick in the chest and an equally-swift finishing thrust from her saw-sword.

It was rather odd, not having her greatsword in-hand at all times, and she decided she’d carry it like she always had when she was in dangerous places. That way, she wouldn’t have to fumble and draw the thing if she were attacked.

Ophelia proceeded down the hall the rude li’l blue’d had come from, the end of which opened into a… courtyard? A garden, open to the sky, set into a lower section of the room, maybe two Ophe(s) down. She entered the room on the higher floor, which surrounded three of the four walls – the left and the far ones, from where she stood.

The garden below… was full of very peculiar flowers, with bulbous growths rather than seeds or sex organs on their middles.

As she approached, they began… the word ‘birthing’ would make it sound far more unpleasant than it truly was, but… _hm_.

Spawning, perhaps.

The flowers disgorged little blue men, multitudes of them, and they sort of… waddled threateningly towards her.

She unleashed tiny Tonitrus’ lightning upon them, felling them as Kin before any given sharp object.

The fact that they themselves _were_ kin wasn’t lost on her, but ‘wheat before the scythe’… it was a cool line, but she felt it was almost derivative.

One of the many began to grow rapidly, reaching several meters tall-

And being struck by multiple bolts of lightning as its body grew in depth and width, too.

It fell without so much as menacing her.

… She _was_ getting a little light-headed from all the blood-bullets she’d used, though. She lit the lantern the ‘Celestial Emissary's’ death had summoned forth and just sat a spell, drinking from her canteen and considering her next course of action. She refilled it, dumped the water on her gore-stained gray hair, then refilled it again, this time scrubbing at her face until she could see her snow-white freckles reflected on her saw-sword – bright green eyes make a good point of reference when using a blade as a mirror.

Well, in truth, she went to draw the saw-sword, then realized there was a darkened window right by the lantern, but she felt like she was being stared at when she stood too near it, and _then_ used the sword.

Eventually, she decided she was fine to press on, and stood, freeing her holy sword to let it sit on her shoulder, and walked around the raised perimeter of the courtyard.

She found precisely nothing, and, with a sigh, picked up a bit of broken masonry and chucked it at the shady window, which predictably shattered, revealing to her a balcony high above the Grand Cathedral.

She hopped down onto it, a short enough drop to be wholly trivial, and stabbed the weird larval thing that had been staring at her while she washed her face.

Served him right.

It wasn’t like he’d be gone forever, anyways.

She made her way forward, stopping to pick up a little glowing bug-like critter – another invertebrate, a phantasm like her precious Augur.

Come to think of it, if these magical invertebrates were part pet and part weapon, shouldn’t she name them?

She carefully removed the Augur from her breast pocket and, one bug in each hand, held them near one another, so they could meet.

“From now on,” she said to the slug-like Augur of Ebrietas, “you’ll be Wiggles.”

Wiggles wiggled a little, and Ophelia smiled a small, soft smile.

Turning to focus on the new, many-legged phantasm more traditionally named ‘A Call Beyond,’ which was rather a worse name for someone to have, really, she said, “And _you_ , mister new bug… I’ll call you Legs.”

Upon closer inspection, Legs didn’t actually have legs so much as cilia, but ‘Cilia’ was a bit too girly a name for such a clearly masculine… whatever he was.

She’d call the next phantasm Cilia. Unless it didn’t have cilia, then-- well, Legs didn’t have legs, did he? But cilia were _like_ legs.

Legs nuzzled her palm as if aware of the mental road he’d sent his new friend down (he was well-aware), his six little – large, relative to his body, though (don’t patronize him) – feeler-like appendages giving her thumb three hugs and a… an inverted head-pat?

A creature with stars and the darkness between within his transparent body (not in, _beyond_ ) was petting her hand with his little head, his tail, which faded to white, wrapped around her middle finger.

The Augur – that is, Wiggles – slithered around in a circle and pointed her tiny blue head in the direction Ophe had been headed before Legs had distracted her.

Ophelia didn’t speak space slug, but that seemed fairly clear, as messages went. Certainly moreso than _‘Seek Paleblood to transcend the Hunt.’_

She slipped Wiggles back into her breast pocket, and Legs into the opposite one, feeding each of them a little from her flask of blood and mercury.

 _Why_ these creatures ate quicksilver, she hadn’t the foggiest idea, but by the gods was it more convenient than lettuce. Well, no, she did have some hypotheses, but- she didn’t know _for sure._

Following Wiggles’ directions, she bumped into a little blue man, apologized, and then stabbed him and dumped him over the railing when he smacked her halfway through her first insistence that it was her fault, really.

She watched him land with a _squelch_ , and some of his gray blood actually splashed far enough to overlap with the dried-out puddle the Bloody Crow of Cainhurst’s corpse laid in. She bit back a laugh and let the guilt of having now killed fully three individuals- wait, no, the larva, but... that didn’t stain the nice floors?  
Three individuals and one godling(!) in _t_ _he_ Grand Cathedral. The one so nice that it got to be _The_ Grand Cathedral rather than just a grand cathedral.

...

She let the guilt of splattering all manner of blood all throughout the very nice church settle in, and stabbed the tendril-y little bluish space man, who had been waiting around the corner for her, without so much as a glance in his direction.

 _Honestly_. She hadn’t fallen for the ‘I’ll wait around the corner and get that Hunter good, I will!’ trick the first time it had been sprung on her, back in Central Yharnam.

Nor the second time – again, in Central Yharnam. And the third, right after the second, when she had collected her bloodstone shard and tried to move on? Not that time, either.

The sickle-lady in Hemwick Charnel, hiding in that covered bridge to the broken tower? Didn’t fall for it.

The carrion crow around the building whose roof had a clean set of white Church dress just waiting for a Hunter to come and take it? Not that time.

She hadn’t fallen for the gargoyles at Castle Cainhurst, either, nor the wolf-beast hanging from the side of that building in the valley hamlet.

A large elevator stood, patiently waiting, to take her down to some unknown chamber. Of all the things she’d seen in the uppermost tier of the Cathedral Ward, that elevator in particular struck Ophelia as being dubious.

Looking back on it later, she’d realize that she’d lost more blood than she had realized, and had been left in quite the haze.

She transformed her holy greatsword once more, planting a chaste kiss on the flat of its blade.

Ludwig had called it his guiding moonlight. Perhaps…

The energy of the abyssal cosmos thrummed within it, and she felt as if it wished her to venture forth.

And so she did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The juxtaposition of slaughter and making friends with a magical bug is delightful.
> 
> That sort of thing is a specialty of mine, I think? The way that Bad Things fit in -- sometimes they're abrupt, over as quickly as they started, and leave everyone wondering what just happened. Sometimes I just lay out something bad as if it's completely mundane, apropos of nothing. Other times, though, they're premeditated. 
> 
> Isn't that the truly horrific thing?


	4. The Altar of Despair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ebrietas is kind.

A shallow underground pool enclosed by warped architecture wasn’t what Ophe had been expecting.

The Great One resting within that chamber pushed it further down the list.

The Great One not turning and vomiting fireballs at her the moment she stepped in the room pushed it to nearly the bottom, right between ‘finding a sense of self-worth in an unlabeled box’ and ‘even _deserving_ to survive this night, let alone be remembered after’.

Wiggles chirped – that was new – in her pocket as the moon-scented Hunter approached the massive, peaceful creature.

It – no, _she_ – was… bizarre. A large, smooth form, with tendrils and tentacles and wings that bore neither membrane nor feather.

Ophelia tried to ‘make contact’ with her, holding the pose for awhile before remembering she could speak.

 _“_ _Use your words, girl,”_ Eileen might’ve said.

She cleared her throat. “Hello,” she said, trying – and, somewhat strangely, _succeeding_ – to sound casual.

That was the blood loss, too, probably.

Blood loss was a much easier explanation for Eileen, though Eileen probably saw right through that and into the heart of the girl who made small-talk with eldritch horrors. That it was an easier explanation for Ophelia herself, well – that was a given, really, wasn’t it?

Again, Wiggles chirped excitedly in her pocket, and Ophe let the slug out and onto the palm of her hand.

“Ah- are you Ebrietas?”

Ophelia circled around to stand in front of the big unknowable girl. She waved at the creature’s front this time, and Wiggles let out a short whistle, a chirp, another, slightly longer and slightly higher whistling sound, and then three sharp chirps, doing a little slug dance as she did so.

Ophe might’ve clapped, had the performer not been in the palm of her hand.

The Great One let out a puff of air from the many yellowish tubes on her face. It was, all told, a _remarkably_ unremarkable experience. Not unpleasant at all, just a little warm.

“I- I don’t know if you understand me-” She paused. “I’m not entirely certain whether or not you even have ears to hear me with. Regardless, I really appreciate the way you’ve not tried to murder me at all. It’s a nice change of pace.”

Ebrietas warbled noncommittally.

“Hey, that’s fair. Don’t feel bad about having reservations about strange women who just waltz into your cave-chamber without so much as a how-do-you-do.”

The Great One raised her head a little, and Ophelia got the sense she was being given a stern look as the creature trilled a short tune, which the Hunter interpreted – in part based on the feeling it gave her – as being a gentle scolding for not giving herself enough credit, and for overlooking her own merits when it suited her internal narrative of self-deprecation, all the while dismissing her weaknesses and shortcomings as things she ‘deserved’ rather than striving to address them.

More strangely, there was a subtler suggestion in the mix.

A suggestion that she hadn’t been like this before.

Ophelia stared, wide-eyed, at the cosmic being.

Ebrietas warbled that none of her loved ones blamed her for the degeneration that had forced her to leave. So they wouldn’t have to watch her wither and die.

Keened that the life she had before had been a…

False dream?

But that her family – her sisters, all of them – loved her dearly.

Trilled that she had not been here, before, but that she could not return after.

She sang a song of letting go – of always keeping the lost in one’s heart, but not letting them weigh it down unduly.

Ophelia wept openly, as her wounds had earlier. “I’m sorry.” She whimpered.

Ebrietas puffed warm air on her and chirred a low, soothing tune.

Who had Ophelia ever known, and loved, that would not forgive her?

The Great One forgave her. Her sisters forgave her. Even though she would never see them again, her mother, her fiance-

A question sprung Ophelia’s mind.

_What did they even have to forgive her for?_

Ebrietas loosed a triumphant, gleeful piping, as if to grab Ophelia by the shoulders and proclaim, _‘Precisely, dear girl!’_

The young woman shook her head as if clearing it of a fog. “But – why was I-”

Ebrietas gestured with her facial tentacles towards something behind Ophelia, and when the Hunter turned to look, a wave of despair washed over her.

An altar, with creature like a petrified, longer-legged Rom upon it, surrounded by clear-white coldblood flowerbuds, which sprouted here and there.

She turned away, towards her new god(?) friend, and the dread was wiped away – now that her heart had been ensnared by and subsequently freed from it, even that point-blank exposure hadn’t truly taken hold.

“I think I’m gonna go hug my hot bird-mom,” Ophelia said at length, “I’ll come by again to visit soon, Ebrietas.” She paused. “You _are_ Ebrietas, right? I’m not just assuming that?”

The Great One lowered her odd head to nuzzle the tiny Human woman and hummed an affirmative, followed by a pleased chirrup.

Ophelia took two steps before stopping to ask one more question.

“Does this mean I can talk to gods?”

Ebrietas loosed a wavy, vibrato sound which Ophelia placed as a giggle.

Then, she sang, with perfect clarity;

_You have always spoken with gods, sweet one,_ _child of man, daughter of none._

Ah.

Of course, she was right.

Ophelia turned and saluted smartly, fist clenched over her left breast, as she had been taught. “Thank you, my lady.”

Ebrietas warbled that Ophelia would have done the same, or – it felt like it would be more accurate to translate it as, “You are absolutely constantly trying to do the same,” but, well…

That’s just a bit embarrassing, innit?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You have to let them go, Ophelia.


	5. Oedon Chapel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eileen worries.   
> How could she not?

The girl had gone off to delve into the Chalice Dungeons.

She’d be fine, of course. Eileen knew that. She knew full well that Ophelia dreamed. She knew that, yet she worried still. The fact that the young woman had been gone as long as she had wasn’t helping with the Crow’s nerves, either, though she couldn’t really hold that against her.

The Hunter was a… _delicate_ woman. In more ways than one. Physically, of course, she was remarkably easy to take down. Djura had once done so by mistake – he’d snatched the girl’s side-sword from her scabbard and walloped her with it in hopes of sending the fresh-faced Hunter packing, and had instead dropped the poor thing like a sack of potatoes. Naturally, Eileen had gone and seen the man, put that ‘scary bird mask’ of hers to use, made sure he’d be kinder next time. At least he hadn’t thrown the girl to the beasts – he’d kept her atop his tower, had his companion man the gun while he made sure she was alright. That had been enough that the Crow hadn’t wanted to rough the poor bastard up, but, _gods_.

Didn’t the beasts give Eileen enough to worry about?

Ophelia’s lack of fortitude was plenty concerning for Eileen, but the girl could throw herself at things as she needed, and seemed like she’d been able to handle what the Hunt had thrown at her up til then. The Crow had seen firsthand that Ophe could be a slippery devil when she needed to be, perhaps too much so – repositioning was well and good, but sometimes Ophelia would panic and dodge and roll and run all over the place. She always seemed to turn those situations around, but… Eileen got the distinct impression that it was a demonstration of controlled chaos and quick thinking moreso than…

Well, moreso than something that wouldn’t worry her mentor so much.

What really concerned the retired Hunter of Hunters, though, was that the girl was sensitive.

Arianna, the… ‘lady of the night’, so to speak, had once told the Hunter that she ‘always looked forward to seeing her leave.’

The wounded expression, the hurt in those innocent green eyes. The inexperience, the way that, in that moment, she hadn’t registered what the other woman had been saying.

How long could Ophelia go without some madman telling her that _she_ was the monster before she started believing it? How many people could compliment the girl’s shapely posterior before she realized that’s what they were doing?

Gascoigne’s daughter was sat in Arianna’s lap, reading some book or another, when none other than Ophelia herself materialized in the middle of the room. She still wore her crow’s-feather cloak, but had changed the rest of her getup. Now, she wore an Old Hunter’s wide-brimmed hat in combination with a thick leather face-collar, leaving only a strip of her visage visible – her bright eyes and just a few of those pale freckles, and silvery brows on top. Her gloves, too, had been replaced with gear the Old Hunters had worn, a brass gauntlet on one side and simple leather on the other. Her trousers had been replaced with frail-looking white leggings made of bone ash, though they came with a plumed skirt which blended very nicely with the black feathers of her cape.

Arianna whistled as the Hunter rose to her feet, and Eileen nobly suppressed the urge to spring up and admonish the poor girl. She stood a little straighter, now, than she had before, or so Eileen thought. It could have been the hat, though.

Ophelia nodded to the flirtatious woman and began to unlace her mask, her eyes darting over to Eileen and the unconscious woman lying in the cot beside hers.

Part of Eileen wished she hadn’t caught the flash of pain on the girl’s face when she saw the doctor hadn’t improved.

When her face had been freed from its protective leather cage, it bore a small smile.

“I don’t know if you’re aware,” Ophelia said, her voice light and clearly telling a joke, “but the labyrinthine catacombs beneath Yharnam?” She wasn’t able to conceal her surreptitious glance towards the comatose Iosefka – not from Eileen, at least.

Her punchline was, “They’re pretty big.”

The girl was much better at jokes than she was at hiding the torment in her eyes.

The Hunter went about her business – reassuring the Chapel Dweller, checking on and flirting with Arianna, talking to the child she’d orphaned, giving the nun her sedatives – she did it all.

Arianna and Gascoigne’s girl had taken up the majority of the time it had taken to do her rounds, of course. They were still sound of mind; still in need of socialization and still able to provide the same to Ophe in return.

When she had pulled Ophelia aside to converse in hushed tones, Eileen’s keen ears had heard most everything.

“I’m afraid there’s something very, very wrong with my stomach, dear.”

Ophelia was quiet for a minute, after that. “I know,” she finally answered.

“Then- do you know what it is?” Arianna’s voice had been hopeful, then.

“Not for certain, but...” The Hunter trailed off thoughtfully.

The blonde giggled. “ _But_ you’re very certain?”

That managed to eke a smile out of Ophelia, who replied, “Yes. I suppose I am.”

“Is there anything to be done about it?”

Ophelia passed Arianna a bottle of pills. Dark glass, with a cork stopper and no label. “I realize I’m asking you to put a lot of faith in me,” she said, “but you must trust me when I tell you that you don’t want to know what’s wrong, and you don’t want to know what those pills are.”

Arianna’s response was one Eileen had been expecting for awhile, and one Ophelia didn’t know how to react to. After casting a furtive glance around, she leaned in and planted a kiss on the silver-haired Hunter of Beasts.

The instructions on how to take the medicine were a bit stammery as a result, but, from where Eileen was sitting, Arianna seemed quite satisfied with the exchange nonetheless.

Arianna had returned to her seat, then, and the little girl had clambered back onto her lap post-haste.

Ophelia had taken the time to lace her face up again.

She took her hat off as she made her way to Eileen, and sat down beside the older woman without needing to ask.

“You’ve gotten stronger, girl.” Eileen purred.

“I have.”

The Hunter placed her hat on the cot beside her and leaned against her mentor, resting her head on the taller woman’s shoulder, her neck sitting strangely thanks to the stiff leather of her gorget.

“You’d have an easier time of that if you took that off.”

Ophelia begrudgingly agreed, and unlaced and removed the protective garment once more, setting it on her hat and then properly leaning on the older woman.

“I found a few runes in chambers raised above their depth, delved to the beginning of the lower Pthumerian catacombs… found some potent, if slightly cursed, blood gems.”

“You sound tired, dear.”

The Hunter blinked. “I _am_ tired, I suppose.”

“Then rest.” Eileen smiled warmly. “What else did you get up to, then?”

“I bought a Blade of Mercy, like yours, from the Messengers in the bath. It’s much faster than than my Moonlight.”

The Crow chuckled. “I should certainly hope so.” She hugged Ophelia closer with one arm. “Where is that greatsword of yours, anyways?”

It was rather notable in its absence. Almost poignant.

“I left it in the Dream.”

“Ah. Fair enough.”

Silence fell between them for a moment.

“I’m going back to the Nightmare,” Ophe eventually said.

Worry creased Eileen’s brow, and she squeezed the Hunter a little. “Will you at least rest, first?”

“Mmh.” She nuzzled the Crow’s shoulder, leaned into her a little more. “Well,” she replied, her eyes already shut, a sly grin worming its way into her voice, “if you insist...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate title: The Concerned Corvid vs. the Craven Raven

**Author's Note:**

> It always comes back to blood and eyes, doesn't it? In the end.


End file.
